The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Literary Studies

The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Literary Studies
Author: Lisa Zunshine
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 681
Release: 2015
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 0199978069

The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Literary Studies applies developments in cognitive science to a wide range of literary texts that span multiple historical periods and numerous national literary traditions.

Cognitive Literary Science

Cognitive Literary Science
Author: Michael Burke
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 369
Release: 2016-12-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0190643072

This book brings together researchers with cognitive-scientific and literary backgrounds to present innovative research in all three variations on the possible interactions between literary studies and cognitive science. The tripartite structure of the volume reflects a more ambitious conception of what cognitive approaches to literature are and could be than is usually encountered, and thus aims both to map out and to advance the field. The first section corresponds to what most people think of as "cognitive poetics" or "cognitive literary studies": the study of literature by literary scholars drawing on cognitive-scientific methods, findings, and/or debates to yield insights into literature. The second section demonstrates that literary scholars needn't only make use of cognitive science to study literature, but can also, in a reciprocally interdisciplinary manner, use a cognitively informed perspective on literature to offer benefits back to the cognitive sciences. Finally, the third section, "literature in cognitive science", showcases some of the ways in which literature can be a stimulating object of study and a fertile testing ground for theories and models, not only to literary scholars but also to cognitive scientists, who here engage with some key questions in cognitive literary studies with the benefit of their in-depth scientific knowledge and training.

A Companion to Literary Theory

A Companion to Literary Theory
Author: David H. Richter
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 498
Release: 2018-02-16
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 111895873X

Introduces readers to the modes of literary and cultural study of the previous half century A Companion to Literary Theory is a collection of 36 original essays, all by noted scholars in their field, designed to introduce the modes and ideas of contemporary literary and cultural theory. Arranged by topic rather than chronology, in order to highlight the relationships between earlier and most recent theoretical developments, the book groups its chapters into seven convenient sections: I. Literary Form: Narrative and Poetry; II. The Task of Reading; III. Literary Locations and Cultural Studies; IV. The Politics of Literature; V. Identities; VI. Bodies and Their Minds; and VII. Scientific Inflections. Allotting proper space to all areas of theory most relevant today, this comprehensive volume features three dozen masterfully written chapters covering such subjects as: Anglo-American New Criticism; Chicago Formalism; Russian Formalism; Derrida and Deconstruction; Empathy/Affect Studies; Foucault and Poststructuralism; Marx and Marxist Literary Theory; Postcolonial Studies; Ethnic Studies; Gender Theory; Freudian Psychoanalytic Criticism; Cognitive Literary Theory; Evolutionary Literary Theory; Cybernetics and Posthumanism; and much more. Features 36 essays by noted scholars in the field Fills a growing need for companion books that can guide readers through the thicket of ideas, systems, and terminologies Presents important contemporary literary theory while examining those of the past The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Literary Theory will be welcomed by college and university students seeking an accessible and authoritative guide to the complex and often intimidating modes of literary and cultural study of the previous half century.

Thinking with Literature

Thinking with Literature
Author: Terence Cave
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 218
Release: 2016
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 0198749414

Thinking with Literature offers a succinct introduction to a cognitive literary criticsm. Broad in scope but focusing on a particular cluster of approaches, it aims to induce a change of perspective in the reader.

Cognitive Literary Studies

Cognitive Literary Studies
Author: Isabel Jaén
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2013-04-01
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9780292754423

Over the past decade, our understanding of the cognition of literature has been transformed by scientific discoveries, such as the mirror neuron system and its role in empathy. Addressing questions such as why we care so deeply about fictional characters, what brain activities are sparked when we read literature, and how literary works and scholarship can inform the cognitive sciences, this book surveys the exciting recent developments in the field of cognitive literary studies and includes contributions from leading scholars in both the humanities and the sciences. Beginning with an overview of the evolution of literary studies, the editors trace the recent shift from poststructuralism and its relativism to a growing interdisciplinary interest in the empirical realm of neuroscience. In illuminating essays that examine the cognitive processes at work when we experience fictional worlds, with findings on the brain’s creativity sites, this collection also explores the impact of literature on self and society, ending with a discussion on the present and future of the psychology of fiction. Contributors include Literature and the Brain author Norman N. Holland, on the neuroscience of metafiction reflected in Don Quixote; clinical psychologist Aaron Mishara on the neurology of self in the hypnagogic (between waking and sleeping) state and its manifestations in Kafka’s stories; and literary scholar Brad Sullivan’s exploration of Romantic poetry as a didactic tool, applying David Hartley’s eighteenth-century theories of sensory experience.

Introduction to Cognitive Cultural Studies

Introduction to Cognitive Cultural Studies
Author: Lisa Zunshine
Publisher: JHU Press
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2010-07-15
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1421400286

Drawing on the explosion of academic and public interest in cognitive science in the past two decades, this volume features articles that combine literary and cultural analysis with insights from neuroscience, cognitive evolutionary psychology and anthropology, and cognitive linguistics. Lisa Zunshine’s introduction provides a broad overview of the field. The essays that follow are organized into four parts that explore developments in literary universals, cognitive historicism, cognitive narratology, and cognitive approaches in dialogue with other theoretical approaches, such as postcolonial studies, ecocriticism, aesthetics, and poststructuralism. Introduction to Cognitive Cultural Studies provides readers with grounding in several major areas of cognitive science, applies insights from cognitive science to cultural representations, and recognizes the cognitive approach’s commitment to seeking common ground with existing literary-theoretical paradigms. This book is ideal for graduate courses and seminars devoted to cognitive approaches to cultural studies and literary criticism. Contributors: Mary Thomas Crane, Nancy Easterlin, David Herman, Patrick Colm Hogan, Bruce McConachie, Alan Palmer, Alan Richardson, Ellen Spolsky, G. Gabrielle Starr, Blakey Vermeule, Lisa Zunshine

Cognition, Literature, and History

Cognition, Literature, and History
Author: Mark J. Bruhn
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 284
Release: 2013-11-26
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1317936868

Cognition, Literature, and History models the ways in which cognitive and literary studies may collaborate and thereby mutually advance. It shows how understanding of underlying structures of mind can productively inform literary analysis and historical inquiry, and how formal and historical analysis of distinctive literary works can reciprocally enrich our understanding of those underlying structures. Applying the cognitive neuroscience of categorization, emotion, figurative thinking, narrativity, self-awareness, theory of mind, and wayfinding to the study of literary works and genres from diverse historical periods and cultures, the authors argue that literary experience proceeds from, qualitatively heightens, and selectively informs and even reforms our evolved and embodied capacities for thought and feeling. This volume investigates and locates the complex intersections of cognition, literature, and history in order to advance interdisciplinary discussion and research in poetics, literary history, and cognitive science.

Why We Read Fiction

Why We Read Fiction
Author: Lisa Zunshine
Publisher: Ohio State University Press
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2006
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 0814210287

Why We Read Fiction offers a lucid overview of the most exciting area of research in contemporary cognitive psychology known as "Theory of Mind" and discusses its implications for literary studies. It covers a broad range of fictional narratives, from Richardson s Clarissa, Dostoyevski's Crime and Punishment, and Austen s Pride and Prejudice to Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway, Nabokov's Lolita, and Hammett s The Maltese Falcon. Zunshine's surprising new interpretations of well-known literary texts and popular cultural representations constantly prod her readers to rethink their own interest in fictional narrative. Written for a general audience, this study provides a jargon-free introduction to the rapidly growing interdisciplinary field known as cognitive approaches to literature and culture.

The Cognitive Humanities

The Cognitive Humanities
Author: Peter Garratt
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 265
Release: 2016-11-23
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1137593296

This book identifies the ‘cognitive humanities’ with new approaches to literature and culture that engage with recent theories of the embodied mind in cognitive science. If cognition should be approached less as a matter of internal representation—a Cartesian inner theatre—than as a form of embodied action, how might cultural representation be rethought? What can literature and culture reveal or challenge about embodied minds? The essays in this book ask what new directions in the humanities open up when the thinking self is understood as a participant in contexts of action, even as extended beyond the skin. Building on cognitive literary studies, but engaging much more extensively with ‘4E’ cognitive science (embodied, embedded, enactive, extended) than previously, the book uses case studies from many different historical settings (such as early modern theatre and digital technologies) and in different media (narrative, art, performance) to explore the embodied mind through culture.

Aspects of Literary Comprehension

Aspects of Literary Comprehension
Author: Rolf A. Zwaan
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 201
Release: 1993-01-01
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9027222177

Given the fact that there are widely different types of text, it is unlikely that every text is processed in the same way. It is assumed here that for each text type, proficient readers have developed a particular cognitive control system, which regulates the basic operations of text comprehension. The book focuses on the comprehension of literary texts, which involves specific cognitive strategies that enable the reader to respond flexibly to the indeterminacies of the literary reading situation. The study relies heavily on methods and theoretical conceptions from cognitive psychology and presents the results of experiments carried out with real readers. The results are not only relevant to research problems in literary theory, but also to the study of discourse comprehension in general.